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Roughly two years ago today, Metrolinx announced that it would end its pilot project of running one GO Train in both directions between Toronto and London, effective October 2023.

Two years on, I'm annoyed that the end result of this pilot project has been worse service from VIA Rail.

Before the London pilot project, VIA ran two trains a day, each way, between Toronto and London via Kitchener. One left Sarnia at. 6:10 in the morning, passed Kitchener at around 9:20, and got into Union at 10:50. A second train departed London at 7:51 in the evening, stopped at Kitchener at 9:45, and arrived in Toronto at 11:15 at night. Return trains from Toronto departed Union at around 11 a.m. (admittedly this train was kind of useless) to London, and at 5:40 in the afternoon, getting into Sarnia at 10:20 p.m.

Today, that's only one train, leaving Sarnia later in the morning, passing Kitchener at noon and getting into Toronto at 1:40 p.m., with the return trip departing Union at 5:40 p.m. This had the effect of reducing train service between Kitchener and Toronto on the weekend from two trains each way to one. And while I have no proof that the Metrolinx pilot project caused VIA's cutback, the fact that this change at VIA happened just weeks into the launch of the Metrolinx pilot project suggests a considerable cause and effect.

By all accounts, the Metrolinx pilot project was something of a failure. Ridership was low. The problem was, the trip was an excessively long run for a so-called commuter train. At close to four hours, the seats were uncomfortable, and tthere were no provisions for snacks and drinks. At least there were washrooms in every car. People in London wanting to commute to Toronto had faster and more comfortable VIA Trains operating to Toronto via Brantford. However, the service still provided an important second daily link between Toronto and the communities of Stratford and St. Mary's. Now they have only one. Similarly, Kitchener has lost the opportunity of an evening trip home after visiting London.

Whoever is responsible, it's shameful that an attempt to improve public transit in southwestern Ontario has ended up making service worse, and I call upon the Ontario government to step in. I believe there is a demand for improved train service into southwestern Ontario and if Ontario wants it, Ontario should pay for it. However, they should pay VIA to provide it.

Train travel to southwestern Ontario won't be commuter-based. It will be intercity based, and the equipment should reflect that. The trains should have more comfortable seating for those longer journeys. There should be a cafe car for snacks and meals on these journeys. This is the sort of service VIA runs, and Ontario should help out with funds to purchase the equipment needed for VIA to expand. You could add to the Siemens Venture order that Ontario Northland has already piggybacked off of for its restored Northlander train. Or GO's bilevels could be retrofitted with the long-distance seating and cafe car equipment which is already available from Bombardier.

There is plenty of precedent for this sort of arrangement in the United States, where states can top up Amtrak's subsidies to run increased state-based service. Just as there is Amtrak California, we could use VIA Ontario.

At the very least, let's restore the missing VIA services that Metrolinx left behind as it pulled its train out of London. The communities enroute deserve nothing less.

Why am I calling them shameless? I attended the June 19/25 TRAC meeting. I sat in the front row of the gallery to ensure that I could both hear speakers as well as see any maps or Figures put up on the overhead screen. Just now I have sat watching the first hour and twenty minutes or so video of that TRAC meeting as it is available on the Woolwich Township website. I am almost speechless.

One particular map was put up on the screen that was very relevant. Unfortunately it was difficult to read in particular the tiny little yellow rectangles representing POTENTIAL OFF-SITE CHLOROBENZENE SOURCES.  It was at the 50:38 (fifty minute 38 seconds) mark of the TRAC video. Holy crap but Lanxess can't get their story straight! That map of Elmira has four or five potential off-site source areas for chlorobenzene. They appear to be within the blocks of Industrial Dr., Union St, Howard Ave. and First St. It appears as if both Borg and Varnicolor are coloured yellow as well as others .

Keep in mind that I've stated for at least the last fifteen years that there are other sources of chlorobenzene than just Uniroyal Chemical. Perhaps seven years ago Dr. Neil Thompson of U. of Waterloo wrote a Conceptual Site Model (CSM) in which he agreed that others had leaked chlorobenzene into the groundwater besides Uniroyal. Then last summer/fall I asked Allan Deal (GHD) publicly if he agreed or not. He was presenting a new, updated CSM. and he emphatically denied any second source of chlorobenzene to Elmira's groundwater.

Keep in mind that I am not conflating a second source with what Jesse Wright of Arcadis (sort of another Lanxess mouthpiece) referred to as secondary sources. These are not direct infusions of contaminants from an industrial source at the surface but are back diffusion (leakage) from the aquitards (clay & silt) which occurs as the aquifers (sand & gravel) concentrations of chlorobenzene slowly decreases over time which induces the chlorobenzene in the adjacent aquitards to then release their chlorobenzene back into the aquifers. 

I used to think of councillor Bauman as Mr. Flip Flop. This is a breath taking flip flop by Lanxess.

When I worked for consulting firms before I was self-employed, there were benchmarks consultants had to meet for billable hours per year, and often some metrics for non-working time as well. As an independent consultant, I haven’t really set targets for myself in the same way.

Last fiscal year, I booked all of my time, accounting for every hour in a standard work week (or more than standard if I had more billable time than the standard in a given week). In previous years, I often only tracked billable hours or CPD (continuing professional development) hours (for CPA reporting). My timesheets are for billing, not for payroll, so there was no need for accounting for a set number of hours, except for my own analysis.

My fiscal year ends on Monday (June 30th), and I’m at the point where I have reviewed last year as well as working on planning for my next fiscal year. I already knew what I’d be doing on Monday, so I booked that time in Harvest ahead of time and finished my analysis over the weekend. It was my worst year on record for utilization and billable hours, by a lot. Ugh. Next year’s target is higher than this year's, even though I missed last year's target by a mile. I expect to have fewer distractions this year than last year, and have a few more “irons in the fire” in terms of potential work to fill the gaps I had this year.

I created targets for my time in various buckets to track billable time vs. administrative activities vs. non-working time. I broke out non-working time into 4 different categories with a “budget” (target number of hours), but made the mistake of having some ill-defined categories where my time could go in more than one bucket, so it was a bit of a “garbage in, garbage out” situation in the end. I altered the categories for next year and re-allocated some of my time to where they should have been so it will be somewhat more consistent with this coming year for a comparison year over year.

My time buckets (other than billable time) are now: administration, time off, family time, self-improvement time, and idle time, aka “on the bench”. For those of you not from a consulting background, if you don’t have work to do in a given day, you were often referred to as being “on the bench”, as in “put me in, coach, I’m ready to play!”.

Last year, I originally had sick time in with family time (I had called it “family and personal” but some things I had booked as personal time were just days off). I also had split Admin out into business development vs. everything else, which seemed like a distinction I didn't need to isolate for tracking.

The biggest challenge I had was my inconsistent human behaviour: it was too easy to manipulate where I booked the time based on how I felt that day. For example, if I felt bad about booking idle time to “on the bench”, I often would convince myself “I took the rest of the day off” and book it as time off. It was easy to blur those lines. I have an idea on how to approach that differently next year. Bench time should be an indication of lost revenue, ultimately, which is different than a conscious decision to take time off from work.

I have a PowerBI report emailed to me daily where I pull my data from Harvest APIs to monitor several pieces of information, one of which is hours vs. these targets. I’m also using it to track outstanding invoices (how many and their amounts), utilization rate, year-to-date billable hours vs. total hours booked, billings by month compared to the previous fiscal year, and active client projects' hours vs. estimates. I review it every evening, and it works nicely to keep me aware of where I'm at throughout the year.

Here is a screenshot of my daily report, with the details blurred for confidentiality.

I’ve set targets for the same general buckets noted above, covering the 261 weekdays that make up my next fiscal year.

• Billable hours: I had a target number of days in my head, but to confirm whether it was realistic or not, I took a look at how much I've billed my various clients over the past year or two. Based on how much I'm aware of their plans and projects for this year, and the trends recently, I created a low, high and budget estimate for each active and potential client on where I think I’ll end up which helped me see where I’m trending vs. the number in my head I started with.
• Time off: There are 10 statutory holidays in Ontario where I live, plus a vacation day allotment that would be equivalent to what I might have if I were employed elsewhere, and then a small buffer for sick or other time off scenarios that are not “fun”. I’m not going to differentiate why it’s time off, just that it is different from “on the bench”.
• Family time: If I did not have power of attorney duties to fulfill, I would not even have this isolated in its own category, but it took up a lot of my time last year. I set a target based on how often I plan on visiting, as each visit takes up most of a day, with it being close to 2 hours each way in travel time, plus the visit and any other business I have to attend to while I’m there.
• Learning time: I’ve set a target for time spent on self-improvement, whether it be at conferences or learning in other forms. I’m often learning on my own time, but if I have time to do some of this during business hours, that time will be booked here.
• Administration: I’ve set aside some hours per month for the regular activities surrounding a business,s plus a bit extra this year for some specific system and process improvements I started making last year. I know I have the time available, so I may as well use it and track against it.
• Idle time is "on the bench", and there is no target, as I expect that it is zero hours. When work is slow, I should be scheduling my time to focus on admin and learning if I'm not otherwise off for vacation or family time.

As far as changing my tracking approach, I will be more deliberate in planning time off this year than I was last year. What I hope to do - as much as my imperfect human behaviour will allow (LOL) - is regularly review my schedule and workload, schedule my time off where it fits, and if I end up with idle time that wasn’t planned for, it will get charged to “the bench”. That’s my theory anyway! 😄

Some areas I’m not going to track are where the time flows into my personal time. I will track CPD hours for my CPA designation separately since it is often a mix of business and personal time that it’s done on. I am only trying to account for my standard work week now, not all other kinds of non-billable time that I need or want to track. If CPD occurs during business hours, it would just get booked to "learning" like any other learning, but I won't capture all of it this way.

Ultimately, some of the time buckets are only there to book my time against when I have time during business hours to use for them. When client work is busier, many of those activities move to evenings and weekends and thus don’t get tracked anymore: visits to my relative shift to a weekend, bookkeeping gets done after hours, learning is done on my own time, etc.

I don't want to be 100% billable, that's not my goal. If I approach that level of busy-ness, then things I still need to do for my business inherently will be after hours or on weekends. I'm at the stage of my career where that's not a trade-off I'm willing to make anymore. I do some client work on evenings and weekends occasionally, some things just can't always be done during business hours, but those are typically scheduled, and I trade off business hours where I can, so I still am booking to the same standard work week overall.

I'd be curious how many other freelancers or independent consultants go through a similar exercise in planning their fiscal years. I really don’t tend to do a detailed financial budget for my overall spending, but I did enjoy working through managing my workdays and accounting for all the hours, not just the billable ones.

KITCHENER - A pitching gem from Owen MacNeil and a home run parade led to a 1-1 record for the Kitchener Panthers over the weekend.

On Saturday, five home runs from the Panthers weren't enough to get the job done as Chatham-Kent won in a walk-off.

On Sunday, MacNeil gave up one hit in seven scoreless innings as Kitchener got some revenge over the Brantford Red Sox.

Yosvani Penalver homered twice, while Charlie Towers, AJ Karosas and Ayad Ansari all went yard.

But it wasn't enough, as Lee Kucera hit a walk-off RBI single in the ninth to put the Barnstormers on top.

Kitchener had a 5-1 lead at one point, but the Barnstormers came through late.

Evan Elliott struck out seven in six innings of work in the start. He gave up four runs off eight hits, but walked six batters and charged with four wild pitches, the first four he's been charged with all season.

Yadian Martinez took the loss, while Eric Pettapiece got the win.

MacNeil the magnificent.

MacNeil the magician.

MacNeil was plain amazing in shutting down the Red Sox, giving up one hit in seven innings in the win. The defense was also spectacular, as MacNeil struck out just two batters.

Meantime, Kitchener got all three of its runs in the third inning, and rode the hot hand the rest of the way.

Yordan Manduley kept strong in the batters box, going three-for-four and extended his hitting streak to six games. 

He had three of Kitchener's six hits on the day, as Connor Irvine also had a strong outing.

He went seven innings, giving up three runs off six hits in the loss. He walked three and struck out three.

Up next, the Panthers are on the road in Guelph on Canada Day against its Highway 7 rivals. First pitch at Hastings Stadium is 7:30 p.m.

The next home game is Thursday, July 3 against Chatham-Kent.

GET YOUR TICKETS NOW and #PackTheJack!

Carrera-Hernández, J. J., Mendoza, C. A., Devito, K. J., Petrone, R. M., & Smerdon, B. D. (2012). Reclamation for aspen revegetation in the Athabasca oil sands: Understanding soil water dynamics through unsaturated flow modelling. In Canadian Journal of Soil Science (Vol. 92, Issue 1, pp. 103–116). Canadian Science Publishing. doi.org/10.4141/cjss2010-035

“For the virtual experiments developed in this work, the adaptive time step option of HydroGeoSphere was used. The output was processed through a series of awk scripts to get daily and/or monthly data, because for some days HydroGeoSphere required 50 or even more subdaily time steps to converge.”

Figure 1. Location of the oil sands regions and the boreal plains within the Canadian boreal forest, with disturbance in the Athabasca region illustrated through the use of a LANDSAT-5 colour composite for (a) August 1985 and (b) September 2010 with coordinates given in meters, UTM-12. The Alberta inset shows the Utikuma Region Study Area (URSA) where evapotranspiration data for aspen were measured.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE.

We’re pleased to highlight this older publication authored by researchers at the University of Alberta, Wilfred Laurier University and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). The paper focuses on understanding soil water dynamics in reclaimed landscapes within the Athabasca oil sands region using unsaturated flow modelling. The study explores how different reclamation strategies affect soil water availability and water table fluxes— critical components for supporting aspen revegetation, a key species in boreal forest ecosystems.

Figure 9. Daily soil water dynamics for different depths of capping material used on top of tailings sand: (a) 0 m, (b) 0.5 m and (c) 1.0 m considering different water table depths commonly found on the boreal plains (2, 4, 6 and 12 m). The top plot shows the variability of the climatological conditions for the simulated period (1919–2006).

In this research, HydroGeoSphere (HGS) was used to simulate soil water movement under various reclamation scenarios over an extended period (1919–2006), integrating long-term climate variability into the analysis. The study tested combinations of reclamation cover thicknesses (0.0, 0.5, and 1.0 m) and water table depths (2, 4, 6, and 12 m) to determine the conditions most suitable for sustaining vegetation, particularly trembling aspen, in reconstructed post-mining landscapes. The virtual experiments captured daily soil moisture profiles and fluxes at the water table, offering a realistic representation of hydrological processes over both wet and dry climate cycles.

HydroGeoSphere’s robust modelling framework allowed for a fully integrated simulation of variably saturated flow under each reclamation scenario. The model incorporated adaptive time-stepping and dynamic boundary conditions, such as net atmospheric fluxes derived from evapotranspiration and precipitation data. Importantly, the simulations demonstrated how the presence of a reclamation cover— especially with a thickness of 0.5 to 1.0 m— could buffer against moisture loss and promote water retention, making it more available to support plant growth.

Results showed that reclaimed landscapes generally experienced less fluctuation in water table fluxes compared to natural settings. The addition of fine-textured reclamation material helped moderate water movement and created more stable conditions for vegetation establishment. Notably, upward flux from the water table— critical during dry periods— was only significant in scenarios with shallow water tables (2 m) and adequate reclamation cover. This highlights the importance of maintaining a water table depth of at least 4 m in order to minimize the risk of salinity impacts from upward groundwater flow, especially during prolonged dry cycles.

By using HydroGeoSphere to analyze these complex interactions over decades of climate variability, the study provides valuable guidance for designing effective reclamation strategies in oil sands regions. The findings emphasize the importance of soil texture, cover thickness, and water table depth in developing sustainable post-mining landscapes that can support long-term forest regeneration and minimize ecological disturbance.

Abstract:

Reclamation of mined areas in the Athabasca oil sands region is required by law, with the ultimate goal of revegetating to species characteristic of predisturbance native plant communities. To develop adequate reclamation strategies, an analysis of soil water dynamics is of utmost importance, as is understanding the impact of the thickness of the reclamation cover. In this work, soil water dynamics and fluxes at the water table were simulated for three reclamation scenarios and compared with the fluxes obtained for natural conditions assuming that aspen is the target reclamation species. According to the simulations, a reclamation thickness between 0.5 and 1.0 m can be used to provide water for revegetation. The numerical simulations show that the reclaimed landscapes have fluxes at the water table that exhibit less fluctuation than natural conditions. To limit the interaction between the water table and atmospheric fluxes, and to limit upward flux, the water table should be deeper than 2.0 m on reclaimed landscapes that use aspen for revegetation, particularly when reclamation takes place during a dry climatological cycle.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE.

The AGM for the KW Granite Club is scheduled for Wednesday, July 16, 2025 at 6:30 pm.

The quote above comes from an anonymous commenter here of two days ago. To this day the Stroh Drain will be draining contaminated groundwater from both the Uniroyal/Lanxess site as well as overland rainfall flow. It was installed after the massive bulk of toxic liquid waste dumping into RPE 1-5 was ended approximately in 1970. It is fair to say that the Uniroyal property and soils were saturated with their liquid wastes to a great depth. Now do keep in mind that the Stroh Drain will be only draining shallow aquifers such as the Upper Aquifer (UA). 

Think about this carefully. The massive volumes of liquid wastes pumped into the five east side pits were done. Yes various swales on the Uniroyal site would still assist southerly flow of rainwater that would be less contaminated than when the pits were operating. Groundwater on the other hand might remain highly contaminated for a very long time. The former low lying swamp on both the Uniroyal and Stroh property originally consisted of both overland flow of liquid wastes as well as of groundwater.  That swamp has been drained by the Stroh Drain, Ditch & Berm (SDDB) hence there no longer is water at the ground surface as the Stroh Drain is dug well below the water table (surface of the shallow aquifer). 

I view the SDDB as a reward to the Stroh family for services rendered. They had allowed, for consideration, toxic liquid wastes from their next door neighbour to flow through their property  and then via the Martin Creek into the Canagagigue Creek. It left however a stinking chemical laden swamp behind. The SDDB drained the swamp on both properties by lowering the water table. It certainly would have been much easier to install the Stroh Drain after the ending of the use of the east side pits for holding massive volumes of toxic liquids. Perhaps the brain trust at Uniroyal thought that the swamp on both properties would dry up when the pumping of liquid wastes to the east side pits ended. That might explain why they waited thirteen years or so to build the SDDB.

Regardless the Stroh Drain as the commenter pointed out "...is brutally damning evidence.".  This Drain is located on the Stroh property in the lowest lying areas which of course is where the overflowing original liquid toxic wastes ended up. As we all know contaminated groundwater takes much longer to attenuate than does surface water. Surface water basically begins cleaning up as soon as the contamination pumped or dumped into it ends. Contaminated groundwater on the other hand can take decades to centuries to clean up. 

I am a year-and-a-bit into my "on-the-fly" education of acting as Power of Attorney (POA will be used as the abbreviation for the rest of this article) for a relative, and let me tell you, it's been a journey and a half. Let me share some of the things I've encountered, in the hope that you, someone who might be writing one up for the future or has already done so, might see this and wonder if there are things you need to consider that you hadn't thought about before.

ALL of the things I have encountered are because of a specific situation:

1. The POA was written and based on New York State law for a U.S. citizen and resident of New York State. She signed her copies in New York with her lawyer.
2. All of the agents named on the POA are Canadian citizens and residents of the province of Ontario. We signed the copies of the POA in Ontario with a lawyer in Ontario (who is also a notary).

Lesson #1: If you can, name a co-agent that is a resident of the State/Province and Country you are in, along with the relatives who are not local, if you have no other option. There are firms that provide these services if there are no people you can trust. "Why" will become apparent further along here.

This relative's father was Canadian, moved to the USA as a young man, lived there the rest of his life, got his US citizenship, got married, had a child, etc. The relative herself is a US Citizen, has always lived in New York state. No siblings, no kids, never married, and no living relatives in the USA, just her cousins in Canada are all she has left, my mom & I included.

When she drafted her Power of Attorney forms a few years ago when she was healthy, it was a natural decision for her to name my mother and me as her agents, since we were the two closest relatives she had (literally and figuratively).

Fast forward to last April when she had a stroke and was unable to care for herself, and quickly lost the cognitive ability to manage her finances. My mom was actually the sole named agent on the POA, with me being the successor agent. The successor agent in this case became "the" agent if the named agent was deceased, unable or unwilling to accept the role (paraphrasing a bit there). This was far too much for my mom to take on, so she signed a letter, we had it notarized, where she essentially handed over the reins to me.

I was fortunate here: my mom and I have a good enough relationship that this transition was within a couple of weeks of us needing to start managing the relative's finances so I have effectively been acting as POA from day 1 even though I wasn't actually able to sign anything on her behalf until a few weeks had passed.

Lesson #2: Here is another "I'm not a lawyer" thing, but if it is possible to name co-agents that can act independently without co-signing everything, ask your lawyer about that to make an educated decision. Some things would have been far simpler if my mom and I were co-agents, especially if we could act independently,y not co-sign everything. With the primary/successor setup, I could do nothing until my mom relinquished her obligations under the POA, even though I'm the accountant with the financial acumen and background suitable for this task.

Picture this: everywhere I needed to submit the POA paperwork, which already was complicated by the fact that my mom wasn't a US citizen or resident, now needed to be accompanied by another letter - notarized - that my mom signed indicating (essentially) that she was unable to perform the duties of POA. If I had a dime for every time I had to explain why I was giving them multiple documents to prove who I am in this scenario, I might be able to buy a nice dinner by now.

My relative had accounts all over the place, mostly credit cards. Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, Tompkins Bank, US Bank, etc., I had to contact a lot of banks to be able to pay off and close these cards.

Bank of America specifically was a massive pain in the ass. I initially called them with her sitting beside me to verify that she allowed me to speak on her behalf, to close the account. They screwed up and didn't close the account. Next time I called without her, they said I couldn't talk to them without her approval, even if it was on record already. I provided the POA just like I did to all the other banks, but it wasn't accepted. She still technically has a credit card there, so at least I was able to log in to inactivate it from being used, since I still can't cancel it. I provided:

• A faxed copy of the original (most banks accepted this, and I quickly closed most of the rest of the accounts).
• Proof of my citizenship and Social Insurance Number (which they needed, apparently).
• A re-notarized "certified copy" which I paid a notary in Ontario to prepare. I watched him take a copy of the original document, of which I had 1 copy of, stamp every single god-damned page, and sign and date every page. I mailed this in. They rejected it.

I gave up. The best I could tell was that this was because I was a non-citizen/resident of the USA, and that's as far as I could get from multiple calls to their call centres.

If at least one agent was a resident/citizen, I suspect this would not have been an issue.

This was a VERY frustrating lesson, but thankfully one that is behind me now. Her investments, minimal as they were, were with Edward Jones USA. During the "draw-down" period in the initial few months, when I needed money transferred to get to the point of eligibility for Medicaid, her advisor got it transferred. Then he was terminated. The new advisor stated he was unable to take direction from me because they are not licensed in Ontario, Canada, where I live. "FINRA" rules they said. Bullshit I said, but apparently it is true.

Here is where Lesson #1 above would have solved everything. No matter what I tried with this advisor, including hiring and paying for a lawyer to try to sort this out with Edward Jones USA corporate lawyers, they were not going to accept the POA because the named agent is in a jurisdiction they are not licensed to operate in.

The biggest issue with this situation is that I had no control over her funds, the majority of her assets were with Edward Jones, and when Medicaid was approved, I owed more money in the "true up" to the long-term care facility that I had no funds to pay with. Additionally, under Medicaid, a person is limited to how much "wealth" they can have, and I would have to prove annually that she is within those limits. Without being able to direct the investments, I had no control over whether something ended up with significant gains and would put her back out of being eligible for Medicaid again. Talk about being in stress city!

Initially, they offered to allow me to transfer the funds to Edward Jones Canada if I opened an account for her here. Problem #1 Her POA prohibits me from opening accounts outside of NY State. Problem #2 In order to move her funds to another account, even in the same broad firm, the funds would need to be liquidated first, and since I was unable to authorize the direction to do that, transferring the funds was therefore impossible. Little known fact: you cannot hold US mutual funds in a Canadian institution's account, even if it's a USD account, just like you cannot hold Canadian mutual funds in a US institution. I didn't know that either.

Ultimately, they told me that this would be resolved when she dies. Just fucking lovely isn't it?

THANKFULLY, I talked the advisor into meeting my relative with me. She has lucid moments, and while I'm not religious in the least, PRAISE THE LORD that the day we met together, she was having a great day, and she confirmed for him that she agreed with my decision to close her account and move her money to her primary bank instead. OMFG I never had as big a victory dance as I did earlier this month when that money was deposited into her bank account. What a shit show.

I ran into this issue twice (so far).

In the first instance, I changed her Medicare Advantage provider to one that had a great plan specific for people in long-term care facilities. I needed to submit the POA to be able to transact on her behalf and get her registered for this, etc., but their legal team said there was no expiry date on the notary's seal. Little did I know that in the US, or at least in NY State, notaries have terms and their seals/stamps have expiry dates. In Canada, or at least in Ontario, lawyers specifically are automatically also notaries public, and it is for life, so no expiration date applies. The POA notarization of my mom's & my signatures originally was done in Ontario with a lawyer here, with no expiry date. I needed to send in proof of her legal licence and another thing proving the fact that there is no expiry date for notaries in Ontario if they are a lawyer. They accepted that, and we moved on.

In the second instance, it is her primary bank asking for this in order for me to open new bank accounts in her name. The money I reference above from her investments is sitting in a checking account that earns 0.01% interest. Not a typo. The POA is already on her account, all is good with that; however, in order to set up new accounts in her name, they needed to prove the validity of the notary. I know she doesn't have much, but I would like it to at least earn a bit more money.

I communicated with the bank that I want to purchase some CDs (Certificates of Deposit), which are kind of like GICs (Guaranteed Investment Certificates) here in Canada. They questioned the validity of the notary. While the POA on her existing accounts is valid and accepted, I was confused at why I needed something new now but at this point in the journey, little surprises me because nothing has been easy.

Initially, I responded with the same 2 supporting documents that I sent to the Medicare Advantage provider, but they were not accepted. They requested an "Apostille". WTF is that, you ask? That was my question two weeks ago!

An Apostille is an authentication for a document to be used outside the jurisdiction in which it was notarized. This would be for authorizing any public document, like a birth certificate or diploma or powers of attorney. I had to ask my lawyer who was the original notary because, honestly, I didn't know what this was or how to obtain it.

Lesson #3: The process of getting the Apostille for the POA was actually pretty painless. For my specific scenario, it was a Service Ontario function. I went here www.ontario.ca/page/authenticate-document-use-outside-canada to start the process, then I went to Toronto to the 777 Bay Street location where "ODS" (Ontario Document Services) is located to get the Apostille. It cost me $16. It also cost me $23 to park for 2 hours, LOL, but that's Toronto for you. I went and waited, and end to end took me an hour to get this done (and an hour+ drive each way I should add!). Well worth the drive to just get it done in my opinion, as the alternative was to mail the original POA to them, and the chances of it getting lost were too high for me to risk.

In my specific instance, a document notarized in Ontario for use in the USA was what this Apostille is for: to validate the notary and authorize it for use outside of Canada. What was fascinating to me is that it is now permanently attached to the original POA I provided with this clip in the upper left-hand corner, such that I cannot take it off or it invalidates the Apostille.

I say that with more than a bit of sarcasm in my voice. I think of how little I understood what was involved in being a POA, let alone this US-Canada stuff, and I am amazed at what I have learned this past year.

Lesson #4: If possible, when you draft your own POA, have multiple copies of it with original signatures and notaries. Scanning it in will work for numerous scenarios, but some places will need "an original". Bank of America requested 'the original' and I said no, because I only have one with the original ink signatures and seals. I still only have one, and it now has the Apostille attached to it, so it is forevermore joined into a single document that I would be unable to take apart if I needed to. Ideally, if I had a second (or more) "original" versions, that would be useful in case it needed to be sent somewhere.

Lesson #5: If possible in this situation, I would have (could have, should have) gone to NY State to sign the POAs there and be notarized in the US, but overall, that was the least of the issues. The citizenship was far more of a hassle than the authentication of the notary in the end. Fortunately, the letter my mom signed relinquishing her role as agent we did have notarized in the US, so I did not need to get an Apostille for that document.

This has been a long, trying year of struggles, mostly with things relating to the POA acceptance. Admittedly, this scenario is unique; most people in the US don't have a Canadian POA and have other options. For those in my scenario, if you can revisit things now before you need the POA, great. If you are in my scenario and planning to draft your own POA, possibly this may give you some things to consider. The majority of these issues were because I don't live in the US and am not a US citizen, full stop.

Some lies are white lies as when a friend asks you for feedback on something they've done and you really don't want to hurt their feelings hence you soften your comments  somewhat. Everybody "lies" at one point or another. Pathological liars however get a rush out of telling lies and "fooling" whomever they're talking to. Sometimes the lies are for the purpose of self-aggrandizing other times to avoid censure for actions or mistakes made.  

Then there are corporate and or business lies. These are the lies whereby an employee, manager or director feels an obligation to protect his business or employer. Perhaps there is also a loyalty to the shareholders as well as the others putting staff into a conflict of interest situation. These are the situations whereby staff are often expected to view the situation as them versus us. When the "us" is providing your food and shelter and the "them" is either the general public or even some authority (eg.  Min. of Environment) the choice is easy. 

These are the realities of corporate control over their staff. Especially in a non-union environment corporations can fire at will provided some notice or pay in lieu of notice is given. Take the example here in Elmira, Ontario. Any number of staff or employees could have ratted out the company (s) over the years albeit the risks to career and financial stability would be extreme. This is why both the public and the government (MECP) need verification of all facts and statements provided by the corporation. Many of the issues here could have (and should have) resulted in many more millions of dollars to clean up their mess. This ongoing corporate lying unfortunately needs to be expected. 

Here in Elmira the corporation (Lanxess) has the best of both worlds. Not only can they lie at will but their lies have mostly been given the green light by the MECP. These lies not only save the company millions of dollars but they also protect the Ministry of Environment (MECP) and the government of the day from public condemnation. Corporate lying backed by elected officials both locally and provincially is very difficult to beat. Just ask Uniroyal Chemical, Crompton, Chemtura and now Lanxess Canada. 

Stephen received vital support while homeless through ShelterCare.

You might not realize it to look at him today, but Stephen has always been a hard worker. He used to work six days a week at Food Basics in shipping and receiving.

“Now, I couldn’t even do a day,” said Stephen.

Stephen, now 66, was diagnosed with scleroderma three years ago – a fatal autoimmune disorder where the immune system attacks the body, causing scarring and lasting damage.

For Stephen, that damage led to a badly damaged esophagus, making it impossible for him to eat regular food. He receives most of his daily nutrition intravenously, through a catheter.

Stephen was hospitalized shortly after his diagnosis and spent nearly a year living in Grand River Hospital because he had no place to go. Stephen lost the lease on his apartment during this time.

“It was hard in the hospital,” said Stephen. “I kept wondering, ‘Am I ever going to get out?’”

But because of House of Friendship’s unique ShelterCare program, which provides onsite health care and other support, Stephen finally left his hospital bed and moved into our program in 2024.

“I had a room with a little mini-fridge to keep my antibiotics in, and the Gatorade that I needed to drink to stay healthy,” said Stephen. “And I appreciated it, but it wasn’t the best place for me long-term.”

Stephen worked with Crystal, his support worker, who worked hard to find permanent housing for Stephen – and ensure that his healthcare support would continue.

“They kept on pushing and pushing for me to get housing,” said Stephen. “Crystal was a lifesaver.”

Finally, after receiving a letter from his doctor outlining the severity of his condition, Stephen was bumped up on the regional housing list, getting an
accessible apartment in Kitchener.

In his new apartment, Stephen has nurses visiting him regularly, along with a personal support worker who helps him shower. He also lives near a medical lab, making it easy to keep up with the regular bloodwork his condition requires.

Stephen is thankful for the support he received while at ShelterCare.

“It was nice knowing I had someone in my corner fighting for me,” said Stephen. “I don’t know what I would have done without that.”

Thank you for your faithful, compassionate support of our ShelterCare program, where men like Stephen get the help they need while struggling with homelessness. You are providing stability, dignity, and hope – thank you

The post Getting Vital Care While Homeless appeared first on House Of Friendship.

♦

KITCHENER - Call it a missed opportunity.

The Kitchener Panthers, down by two, had the bases loaded with nobody out in the bottom of the ninth.

Former Panther Jorge De La Cruz came in, and other than a wild pitch to score a run, was able to limit the damage and close out a 4-3 win for the visiting Brantford Red Sox Thursday night.

Yosuke Fujie hit a two-run single in the fourth to give Kitchener a 2-0 lead.

But the Red Sox got it close, an RBI double from Christian Ortega made it 2-1.

In the seventh, Rene Tachioka hit a ball deep to right field. 

It looked as if Yosvani Penalver made a catch at the wall, sacrificing his body. Turns out the ball was over the fence for a two-run home run, and Penalver was down for several minutes but would stay in the game.

Brantford added an insurance marker in the ninth.

Runta Osawa was consistent, nabbing three hits for Kitchener, who had trouble with the Brantford pitching staff.

Nicholai Arbach struck out eight in five innings of work. Colbey Klepper got the win, fanning five more in three innings and only gave up two hits.

Andy Vargas took the loss. He gave up three runs on six hits in seven innings, striking out five and walking three.

Kitchener heads out on the road for three games. Saturday in Chatham-Kent, Sunday in Brantford and Canada Day down Highway 7 in Guelph.

The next home game for the Panthers is Thursday, July 3 against the Barnstormers at 7:30 p.m.

GET YOUR TICKETS NOW and #PackTheJack!

The stage is set for an unforgettable 2025/26 season at Centre In The Square. With a bold, wide-ranging lineup of music, theatre, dance, comedy, and cultural experiences, this year’s programming offers something for every kind of arts lover!

To celebrate the season launch, The Record recently featured an article highlighting what audiences can look forward to — from iconic Canadian acts and international touring productions to new work by emerging voices in our Studio Theatre. It’s a season designed to entertain, inspire, and bring our community together.

Read the full article below to get a closer look at what’s in store:
Explore the 2025/26 season preview at The Record

Tickets are on sale now. We look forward to welcoming you this fall.

"Lanxess has speculated that years ago, toxic chemicals called dioxins and furans were blown onto the farm by wind, or washed there by rain." This is a statement Jeff Outhit (reporter)wrote and was  published in the January 4, 2019 Record . Of course it was but one of many over the decades that raised hopes that Uniroyal/Lanxess were going to do the right thing by both local residents and other downstream lifeforms.

It was not to be. Exercising their uncanny ability to contort truth and facts until they are unrecognizable, Lanxess have dogmatically insisted that they have examined the whole site. Perhaps this harkens back to their former environmental engineer, Jeff Merriman who ingenuously suggested that his world class nose and eyes could pick out sub-surface contamination with ease. No need for professional testing here folks as I (Jeff) declare that all is well. 

Polluters like Uniroyal/Lanxess have learned how to battle stubborn pollution with words when they are unwilling to do the cleanup necessary. For example :  "Soil tests have found a shallow ribbon of contaminated dirt on the farm, up to 500 metres long but limited to the top 15 centimetres and less than nine metres from the factory boundary." Isn't that just amazing. Perhaps the senior Mr. Stroh had put a sign on his property advising that " The premises are monitored 24/7 and any incursions by free flowing liquid toxic wastes past the nine metre mark will immediately result in a manure barrage." or some other equally insidious deterrent. Or perhaps the senior Mr. Stroh had buried sensors along his property line with Uniroyal/Lanxess deeper than 15 centimetres (5.9 inches) which threatened a barrage of contaminated earthworms would be unleashed upon the company. 

The facts are clear. Lanxess have NOT properly sampled or tested the Stroh farm because they are afraid of the truth. They continue to lie and hide behind the Min. of Environment (MECP) as well as Woolwich Council who clearly have been indoctrinated into believing that they must support Uniroyal/Lanxess's verbal nonsense no matter the reality.. 

♦

Amid the 100 acres of farm in Saint-Pascal-Baylon, a few minutes outside Rockland, I see and hear a group of farmhands pounding stakes into the ground for a trellis system on which will grow cucamelons.

Also, known as “mouse melons,” the grape-sized fruits look like tiny, cute watermelons and are one of dozens of crops growing at Jardin Boulay Garden, owned by Mary Lynn Boulay.

The work of pounding the stakes is certainly not cute in the blasting sun of the day, however. Atop the ladder, Olivia Romeo wields a heavy maul with sister Sophia Romeo and Jardin Boulay Garden co-farmer Stephane Berube – Boulay’s husband – holding the ladder steady.

What is perhaps unique about the Romeo sisters, who live a only a country-lane or two away from the farm, is that they love the work of farming, though they have real no real interest in becoming farmers: Olivia, 21, is a university psychology student, while Sophia, 22, works at an area grocery store.

Young farm hands working the land
The pair, who have worked the farm for several years, simply love tending to the fields and crops and helping grow food that the community eats. I admire their work ethic in the blasting sun and humidity.

“I like working hard. It’s rewarding,” Olivia says, with Sophia agreeing. “And at the stand selling, there’s the social aspect and getting to see different people from the community. It’s good relationships.”

With small family farms being consolidated into larger corporate entities and with fewer kids wanting to take over the family business of agriculture, it’s encouraging to see young people like the Romeos – essentially Gen Zs – caring about how their food grows and where it comes from.

For her part, Boulay stresses the importance of her farmhands for helping the farm tend the fields and sell the resulting produce at their market stand at the corner of Laurier and Giroux streets in downtown Rockland starting again in a couple of weeks.

“They are very good workers. They’re out here working hard and giving it their all. I depend on them,” Boulay says.

The farm grows blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, kale, tomatoes and just started cherries.

Standing over a field of green spiky leaves, Boulay hands me a fresh garlic scape from a hardneck garlic plant: I snap off a piece and the aroma of garlic released is immediate.

“I’ll be cutting them this weekend,” she says. “All the energy and water then leaves the scapes and goes to the garlic bulbs.”

Near the house, a handful of apple trees will produce the popular Honeycrisp and the venerable McIntosh, among other varieties.

A few metres from the greenhouse, where the season’s crops get their start as tiny sprouts in little plastic trays, is a peach tree with small cucamelon-sized peaches just starting to appear.

“I plant them, water them and transplant them. After that, I have to rely on Mother Nature,” says Boulay.

No farmers means no food
It’s likely that even few customers who shop farmers’ markets and market stands – and know they are buying produce from the farmer – recognize at least somewhat the difficulties and essential hard work in hot conditions that farmers face.

“Most people when they come up to the stand, you know, don’t really know everything that’s gone into what vegetables or fruits we’ve grown,” says Boulay.

Her message, therefore, is a very simple one: support farmers because without them there would be no food …

For more, visit Andre Paquette Editions.

Check out my latest post Gen Z farmhands work Jardin Boulay Garden from AndrewCoppolino.com.

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It is said that all good things must come to an end. I did not apply for renewal [1] for the Microsoft MVP award, and as a result, I will no longer be part of the program as of the end of June 2025.

There are many reasons; no single reason stands out above the rest, but it is the collection of things that made it clear it was the right time for me to withdraw from the program.

Part of it is I have had a challenging year over the timeframe that this renewal period covers, which I've written about in the past. Family obligations are continuing to take up a lot of my time. I could have applied for "consideration" if that was the only thing that prevented me from contributing this year, but it's not, and I don't want to be awarded if I don't deserve it.

Part of it is more related to simply outgrowing the program and needing to focus on other parts of my life. I am no longer as eager and willing to spend my personal time researching and writing blog posts, which also requires time to invest in keeping up with the constantly changing product environment.

I will continue to blog (occasionally), although it might start to be less product-focused and more random musings on both business and personal topics.

I wouldn't have even been a Microsoft MVP in the first place without the support of a generous community of Microsoft Dynamics GP folks. Belinda Allen, first and foremost, who nominated me, and Victoria Yudin and David Musgrave, who graciously shared their blog space(s) to share my blog at a time when I was first getting into sharing my knowledge.

I would be remiss if I didn't also thank Betsy Weber and Rie Merritt for their tremendous support at various times over the years. Betsy was my "CPM" (Community Program Manager [2]), and someone I loved working and interacting with. Rie leads the Data Platform community, including MVPs, and was fabulous to work with, too. I've loved getting to know both of them as well as many others over the years.

I received this email 9 years ago, stating that my good friend, Belinda Allen, had nominated me for the Microsoft MVP Award. I remember being stunned at the time!

I was officially awarded my first Microsoft MVP award on Oct 1, 2016, and wrote about that here: Becoming a Microsoft MVP for the first time. If I was stunned at the time of being nominated, I was even more speechless when I received this email. So many emotions - happiness, excitement, validation, and feelings of being an impostor in a group of highly recognized community members, too!

From that point on, it has been a blur. There's a lot of email, Teams chats, meetings with product groups (optional but part of how you engage and give feedback), and seemingly constant tracking and documenting of contributions for renewals; it never stops. There are many benefits, I don't want to dismiss those, but ultimately, to get the award, you are volunteering your time and energy to give back to the community.

My first award period covered Oct 1, 2016, to June 30, 2018, 21 months! I happened to be awarded just prior to a re-org where the renewals were centralized to a once-a-year timeframe and a lot of us were in this weird limbo period. So, I have 9 "rings" on my MVP Award trophy, but was only awarded 8 times.

Up until last year, I was in the Business Applications award category, as a Dynamics GP MVP. At some point midway through my tenure as an MVP the program stopped referencing specific products within the category so we were all just "Biz Apps" MVPs. This past year, I was in two award categories - M365 and Data Platform - for Excel and Power BI, respectively.

I am thankful for how welcoming the folks in the “new” categories (to me) were, as a relatively long-time MVP but new in those categories. I feel, though, that I never made a dent in the new award categories, having barely gotten started with more active contributions there.

The benefits of being an MVP are tremendous, and I will miss a lot of them. The access to information and people is priceless. As much as the level of information we get can be a firehose, and it was difficult to keep up, I will miss it when it’s gone, I’m sure. All in all though, it’s the right decision and I’m completely OK with no longer having the MVP credentials to my name.

[1] The Microsoft MVP Award is an annual award, based on your contributions for the previous 12 months. At the end of March each year, those of us "up for renewal" need to apply for renewal. There is a cutoff each year so that newly awarded MVPs in recent months don't have to apply for renewal so early in their tenure, but generally it is everyone else that needs to apply. There is no rubber stamp (or shouldn't be). It is expected that we log our contributions throughout the year, and provide documentation to support our contributions - blog stats, podcast viewership, proof of presentations or whatever the contribution types are. The MVP Award team(s) review this, and in early July each year, the MVPs are notified whether they are renewed or not. Each year, we need to re-sign the NDA agreement to accept the award.

[2] CPMs are the connection within the Microsoft MVP Award program for us as MVPs for the program itself, outside of the product groups and specific award category folks we interact with.

While working on a machine learning project, I came across an exciting Python library designed to identify the most important features in a dataset. This is incredibly valuable. I encourage you to read the full article to learn more about this powerful tool — it could help you make a strong impression on your seniors and enhance your project outcomes.

The core concept revolves around Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) for feature selection. To be honest, I had not used it before and was truly impressed by its ability to identify and select the most relevant features for model training in a systematic and comprehensive manner.

RFE (Recursive Feature Elimination) is a feature selection technique that:

1. Fits a model (like Logistic Regression).
2. Ranks features by importance based on the model’s coefficients or feature importances.
3. Eliminates the least important features, one at a time, recursively.
4. Stops when the desired number of features is selected.

The goal of using RFE isto reduce dimensionality by selecting only the most relevant features, improving model performance and reducing overfitting.

RFE (Recursive Feature Elimination) is a technique that removes less important features one by one until it finds the best subset.

But to decide which features are important, it needs help from a machine learning model (called an estimator in scikit-learn).

That model must tell RFE how important each feature is — and it does that using attributes like:

• coef_ → used in linear models (like Linear Regression or Logistic Regression)
• feature_importances_ → used in tree-based models (like Decision Trees or Random Forests)

Imagine you have a teacher (the ML model) helping to grade students (the features).
To help RFE, the teacher must be able to give scores to each student, telling how well they’re doing.

These scores are given through:

• coef_ → for models where coefficients show importance. It tells you how much each feature (column) contributes to the prediction.
• feature_importances_ → for models where features affect decision splits, used in tree-based decision models. It shows how important each feature is in making decisions (splitting the tree).

If a model doesn’t give any scores, RFE can’t know which features to remove!

In short, RFE can only work with models that provide information about how important each feature is — and that’s done using coef_ or feature_importances_ attributes.

In short, we can use RFE with models like Logistic Regression (coef_) , Random Forest(feature_importances_), Decision Tree(feature_importances_) , SVM(Linear Kernel , coef_). But not with models like K-Nearest Neighbours. It just stores the data and makes predictions by looking at the ‘k’ nearest neighbours when you give it a new input. There’s no equation or tree built where features are ranked or weighted. KNN treats all features equally (unless you manually weight them), and you cannot rank features based on importance.

Let’s take an example of Logistic Regression to build a model using RFE and explore some of its key attributes. I am not taking the whole project explanation for Logistic Regression, just digging into RFE. I have used the banking dataset of Kaggle.

from sklearn import datasets
from sklearn.feature_selection import RFE
from sklearn.linear_model import LogisticRegression

logreg = LogisticRegression()

rfe = RFE(estimator = logreg, n_features_to_select = 18)
rfe = rfe.fit(data_final[X], data_final[y] )
print(rfe.support_)
print(rfe.ranking_) 

from sklearn import datasets
from sklearn.feature_selection import RFE
from sklearn.linear_model import LogisticRegression

logreg = LogisticRegression()

In the initial lines of code, we have imported the sklearn libraries RFE from sklearn.feature_Selection and LogisticRegression from sklearn.linear_model.

logreg is a variable for logistic regression to be used inside the RFE for model selection.

rfe = RFE(estimator=logreg, n_features_to_select=18)

In the above line rfe a variable where RFE() is initialized with:

• estimator = logreg: The estimator or the model used to evaluate feature importance.
• n_features_to_select = 18: The number of top features you want to select.

RFE will recursively remove features until only 18 remain.

1. estimatorEstimator instance

A supervised learning estimator with a fit method that provides information about feature importance (e.g. coef_, feature_importances_).

2. n_features_to_selectint or float, default=None

The number of features to select. If None, half of the features are selected. If integer, the parameter is the absolute number of features to select. If float between 0 and 1, it is the fraction of features to select.

You can read more about this from the source I have taken information.

rfe = rfe.fit(data_final[X], data_final[y])
# data_final[X]: The input features.
# data_final[y]: The target variable (label column).

This line fits the RFE process:

• Trains the logistic regression on all features.
• Eliminates the weakest feature (least important) one at a time.
• Repeats until only the top 18 remain.

print(rfe.support_)
output = [False False False False  True False False False  True False False  True
 False False False  True False  True  True False False False False False
 False False False False False False False False  True False False False
 False False False False False False  True  True  True  True False False
  True  True  True  True False False  True False False False  True False
  True]

• This prints a boolean array.
• Each element corresponds to a feature in data_final[X].
• True means that feature was selected.
• False means that feature was eliminated.

print(rfe.ranking_)
output = [38 33 12 35  1 16 26 21  1 32  6  1 10 37 39  1 40  1  1 25 31 42 36 30
 15 43  4  5 41 11 29  7  1 23 44 34 13 14 27 18 17 19  1  1  1  1  3 20
  1  1  1  1 24 28  1  9  8  2  1 22  1]

• This prints the ranking of all features.
• The selected features (top 18) have a ranking of 1.
• A Higher Number indicates a less important feature .

In a nutshell rfe.rankinng output is a list of integers, one per feature(in the same order as our input feature data_final[x]).

• A ranking of 1 means that the feature was selected by RFE (ie one of the top n_features_to_select features).
• A ranking > 1 means that the feature was not selected, the higher the number, the earlier it was eliminated during the recursive process.

Take an instance if data_final[X].columns is: [‘age’, ‘balance’, ‘duration’, ‘job’, ‘marital’]

data_final[X].columns #['age', 'balance', 'duration', 'job', 'marital']

print( rfe.ranking_) # Output = [1, 2, 1, 3, 1]

Then:

• 'age', 'duration', 'marital' were selected (ranking = 1)
• 'balance' and 'job' were not selected (ranking = 2, 3)

In sklearn.feature_selection.RFE, the step parameter controls how many features are removed during each iteration of the recursive elimination process.

There are two ways to use step parameter

Integer Value (step >= 1)

• Specifies the number of features to remove in each iteration.

RFE(estimator=logreg, n_features_to_select=5, step=2) 
# Removes 2 features per iteration, until 5 features remain.

Float Value Between 0.0 and 1.0

• Interpreted as a percentage of remaining features to remove in each iteration.
• The percentage is rounded down to the nearest integer.

RFE(estimator=logreg, n_features_to_select=5, step=0.2)
# Removes 20% of the features each time.

To explain this removal of columns using percentage, I have asked ChatGPT it has given a good table to understand its workin,g which I am attaching here.

When step is a float between 0.0 and 1.0, like 0.2, it is interpreted as a percentage of the remaining features to remove in each iteration. It removes 20% of the current remaining features, rounded down to the nearest integer.

If a larger step is there, it means faster execution but less granular selection.

On the other hand, a smaller step means slower but more accurate feature selection (especially if feature importance changes a lot as features are removed). If step is too large, RFE might remove an important feature too early.

RFE is a powerful tool for feature selection, helping to improve model performance and interpretability.

I conducted thorough research using various online sources, including Google and ChatGPT, to gain a comprehensive understanding of the topic.

If you found this helpful, follow me on Medium and give the post a like!

Your feedback means a lot and motivates me to share more 🚀. Thanks for reading!

This Sklearn Tool for Feature Selection Is a Must-Know for Every ML and Data Science Professional was originally published in Code Like A Girl on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The reporter was Jeff Outhit and he did a good job in letting the public know that the cleanup was neither extensive nor comprehensive. He quoted Sebastian Seibel-Achenbach who referred to Lanxess's story about wind blown dioxins and or rain washed dioxins ending up on the Stroh farm as being "self-serving". While Sebastian is correct, the rain washing dioxins and more onto the Stroh farm does actually validate the fact that gravity flowing toxic liquid wastes travelled eastwards onto the Stroh farm. This also reinforces yesterday's Blog post and many others in which Uniroyal toxic wastes ended up on the Stroh property. The title of this January 4, 2019 story is "Cleanup launched after Elmira chemical factory taints farm next door". 

What has long surprised me is that neither Health Canada nor any provincial or federal food agencies have ever seemed the least bit interested in these highly toxic various chemicals entering our food supply. Above and beyond cattle producing both milk and beef on the farm, the immediate contaminated property has produced both corn and soybeans for decades.  Whether these are for direct human consumption or for indirect consumption via cattle feed, these are serious health issues. When non-smokers and non-drinkers not exposed to toxins on the job get cancers then it becomes obvious that their exposures are from the air they breathe, the water they drink and the food they eat. 

Thank you Uniroyal, Lanxess, MECP and local politicians for your inattention. 

♦

♦The Hangout Market Days
Thursdays July 3 to Aug 28
9:00 AM – 12:00 PM
FREE
The Hangout at Grant’s Café – 99 Ottawa St. S, Kitchener

We hope you are excited to come out and support some local talented people at our weekly Thursday markets at The Hangout! There will be a variety of handmade items for sale. These markets will be rain or shine. Tables will be placed underneath the overhang along the side of the building. Don’t forget to pop into the café and say hello between 8:30 AM and 11:00 AM! We still have some vendor spots left. You can sign up for a free vendor table at the link below!

Click here to register as a vendor

♦

Canada Day at Bingemans
Sunday, June 29
5:00 PM – 10:00 PM
FREE
Bingemans – 425 Bingemans Centre Dr. Kitchener

Celebrate Canada Day early with us on at Bingemans. Kick off the evening at 5:00 PM with a live DJ and lawn games, then catch The Almost Hip (World’s longest-running Tragically Hip tribute band) live at 7:00 PM. Stick around for Southwestern Ontario’s largest fireworks show, lighting up the sky at dusk. Food and drink specials will be available all evening. Bring your own lawn chairs and come early to grab a good spot and parking.

Click here for more info

♦Drag Bingo at AOK
Tuesday, July 1
7:00 PM – 10:00 PM
FREE
AOK Craft Beer + Arcade – Unit B03 – 165 King St. W, Kitchener

Hosted by Peach Blossom & Ultra Violet!!! The event is 19+. Pre-registrater by June 30th to be entered for a door prize, must be present to win. Play for bragging rights and for a selection of prizes donated from local businesses. Bring some tip money for the performers and a winning spirit, and it is sure to be a fantastic night. If you have been wanting to get more connected to the local queer community, this is a great place to start. See you soon!

Click here for more info

♦♦♦

Waterloo Community Picnic♦
Tuesday, July 1
4:00 PM – 10:00 PM
FREE
Waterloo Park – Near the Bandshell

Spend the afternoon on the West side of Waterloo Park with local performers, food trucks and giant games. Browse all sorts of local vendors at the Art Market. Finish the evening with a spectacular LED drone show that will light up the sky.

Click here for more info

Canada Day in DTK
Tuesday, July 1
4:00 PM – 11:00 PM
FREE
Carl Zehr Square – 200 King St. W, Kitchener

Enjoy live musical performances on an outdoor stage from Rebekah Stevens, Grace Too, Terra Lightfoot and Juno Award winners Sloan. You will be surrounded by food trucks, patios and a licensed bar area by the stage. The evening will end with a dazzling pyrotechnics display that will fill the sky with light, colour and sound.

Click here for more info

KPL Green: Forest Heights Hike
Saturday, July 5
10:00 AM – 11:00 AM
FREE – Registration Required
Westheights Public School – 429 Westheights Drive.

This leisurely walk will follow a gentle path as it meanders through delightful hardwoods, typical of urban forests of our area. A pond may also yield several natural delights including Red-winged Blackbirds, Midland Painted Turtles, amphibians and more. We will be on a journey of discovery together!

Click here for more info

Family Yoga In The Park
Sundays, July 6, 13, 20, 27
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM
FREE
Civic Centre Park – 100 Queen St. N, Kitchener

Join us for fun, interactive Family Yoga in the Park. We’ll move, play and connect with our breath and with each other. Using animal and nature themes, we’ll explore poses, stretches and mindfulness. Bring your own mats, borrow one of ours, or practice on the grass. Yoga will be followed by a community hangout. Bring a picnic and blanket, spend time with others and enjoy the simple magic of the trees and park.

Click here for more info

Kitchener Latin Heat Fridays
Friday, July 4
7:00 PM – 11:00 PM
FREE
Carl Zehr Square – 200 King St. W, Kitchener

Downtown Kitchener, the City of Kitchener and TenC Dance Co are collaborating again for a 3rd summer full of heat and flavour. Put on your dancing shoes and join us for Salsa, Bachata and Merengue. This is a Rain or Shine event! We will be in the City Hall Rotunda if it’s a rainy day.

Click here for more info

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♦Roller Skating
Mondays (June 16 – Sept 29)
7:00 PM – 10:00 PM
FREE
Carl Zehr Square – 200 King St. W, Kitchener
Click here for more info

Show and Shine Classic Car Mondays
Mondays June 16 to Sept 15
6:00 PM – 8:30 PM
563 Highland Rd. W, Kitchener
Click here for more info

Live at Lunch
Tuesdays and Thursdays until Aug 28
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
FREE
Carl Zehr Square – 200 King St. W, Kitchener
Click here for more info

The post June 25, 2025: What’s Happening in Your Neighbourhood? appeared first on KW Habilitation.

Dart library to encode and decode various archive and compression formats, such as Zip, Tar, GZip, ZLib, and BZip2.

Dart 446 Updated Jun 16

I know that interest had been renewed due to the Lanxess site tour in early May. I also know that inaccurate statements were made by Lanxess representatives to diminish the credibility of gravity flow of Uniroyal Chemical toxic liquid wastes over to the Stroh property. Of course it has become obvious over the decades that Uniroyal/Crompton/Chemtura and Lanxess are extremely adept at making, polishing and gilding falsehoods until they shine brightly. Then by repeating them over and over again even normally skeptical people can be slowly brought around. Maybe not fully but at least to the point where they know that disputing certain falsehoods is a waste of time. If propaganda worked for Dr. Goebbels then why not for chemical companies as well?

The most obvious proof positive versus mere evidence is both the finding and removal of dioxins/furans and DDT on the Stroh farm next to the Lanxess property line in 2019. Yes it was a typical polluter's Mickey Mouse "cleanup" but at least it proved that Uniroyal crap flowed over to the Stroh property/farm. Further very strong evidence would include the detections of dioxins/furans in the Stroh Drain at about 30 times greater than the federal criteria for sediments afterwards . 

Finally no one from the MECP to Lanxess have ever clarified how NDMA was found in a deep Municipal Aquifer well a couple of hundred metres cross gradient and a little upgradient from Uniroyal/Lanxess.

Of course it is very helpful when both politicians and media know their place in the food chain and are careful not to rock the boat or the gravy train.

On Thursday, March 20, 2025, the Greater Kitchener Waterloo Chamber of Commerce hosted the 2025 Business Excellence Awards Gala, presented by Cowan Insurance Group. The Waterloo Region business community, local dignitaries, and community ambassadors came together to honour the extraordinary contributions of more than 130 nominees across 14 categories.

Congratulations to Libro Credit Union on winning the Employee Engagement Award. This honour is dedicated to the company that puts their employees first and ensures strong growth of their valued staff.

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Libro Credit Union continually demonstrates a strong commitment to employee growth and development. Key initiatives like the DiSC Training, a widely recognized personality assessment tool completed, helped enhance communication, teamwork, and self-awareness, for nearly 700 team members. Programs such as Beyond Libro and the Mentorship Program support career growth and internal community building. Libro Credit Union also demonstrates a strong commitment to employee wellness. They expanded their mental health benefits by over 300% since 2019, ensuring staff have access to counseling and therapy services for themselves and their families.

Libro Credit Union prioritizes diversity, equity, and inclusion, with ongoing training on unconscious bias and inclusive hiring practices to ensure a welcoming environment for all employees. These initiatives have helped increase staff engagement, with 91% of employees expressing comfort in speaking up against discriminatory behaviors. Libro Credit Union has set a benchmark for organizational excellence, creating a culture of inclusivity, employee empowerment, and innovation.

The post Employee Engagement Award Winner: Libro Credit Union appeared first on Greater KW Chamber of Commerce.